![A truck on the road that links Djibouti and Addis Ababa, between Lake Afdera and Awash in the Afar region, January 2014 (Ji-Elle, via Wikimedia Commons, CC BY-SA 3.0) [file photo]](https://i0.wp.com/mereja.com/index/wp-content/uploads/2026/10/economy-djibouti-addis-road-afar-2014-20261008121004-2615.jpg?resize=780%2C585&ssl=1)
A truck on the road that links Djibouti and Addis Ababa, between Lake Afdera and Awash in the Afar region, in January 2014. Photo: Ji-Elle, via Wikimedia Commons, CC BY-SA 3.0 [file photo]
Brent crude averaged $116.8 a barrel in September, up 40 percent from July, while Arabica coffee fell 8.2 percent over the same period to $7.26 a kilogram, World Bank data released on October 2 show.
The two prices pull Ethiopia’s foreign currency accounts in opposite directions, because the country imports all of its petroleum fuel while coffee is one of its biggest export earners, the business news site Birr Metrics wrote in an analysis on Wednesday. The numbers reach the Ministry of Finance as Fitsum Assefa (PhD), whom Parliament approved as Finance Minister on Thursday, takes over from Ahmed Shide, and as the Gov’t tries to build reserves under its market-based exchange-rate system.
According to the World Bank’s monthly commodity price data, known as the Pink Sheet, Brent rose from $83.4 a barrel in July to $90.9 in August and then to $116.8 in September, a jump of 28.5 percent in one month. The bank’s energy price index rose from 108.8 in July to 148.9 in September. Birr Metrics noted that the International Monetary Fund projects Ethiopia’s fuel imports at $4.8 billion in 2026/27, compared with $4.1 billion in 2025/26 under its baseline. In one stress scenario, the IMF estimated a financing gap of $2.9 billion by 2027/28 if high imported fuel prices continued, although Birr Metrics stressed that “the scenario was not a forecast.”
Arabica coffee averaged $7.26 a kilogram in September, down 8.9 percent from $7.97 in August and 8.2 percent from $7.91 in July, and about 14 percent below the 2025 average of $8.47, the World Bank figures show. Ethiopia earned a record $3 billion from coffee exports in 2025/26, according to government figures cited by Birr Metrics, up from about $2.65 billion a year earlier. Birr Metrics cautioned that a fall in the global benchmark “does not mean Ethiopian exporters are automatically receiving 8.9 percent less,” because Ethiopian specialty coffees sell at different prices and some contracts were signed earlier. It added that if lower prices last, Ethiopia would need to sell more coffee or earn higher premiums just to keep the same foreign currency income.
Food and farm inputs also became more expensive. US hard red winter wheat rose from $310 a tonne in July to $347 in September, maize rose 12.3 percent from July to $239.6 a tonne and world sugar rose from 34 cents to 41 cents a kilogram, according to the World Bank data. DAP fertilizer reached $800.6 a tonne in September, about 17 percent above its 2025 average, and Birr Metrics said the IMF expects a new fertilizer procurement round to begin this fall, with fertilizer imports worth roughly one percent of Ethiopia’s GDP. The Ethiopian Statistics Service reported annual inflation of 14.1 percent in August. Kleiman International, a consultancy that analyzes emerging economies, wrote on X on September 29 that Ethiopia’s reserves had been “boosted from near depletion on gold prices,” but that inflation was running at “15%+ on oil imports.”
Birr Metrics described gold as the country’s strongest buffer. Gold averaged $4,319 an ounce in September, below August’s $4,411 but about 25 percent above its 2025 average, and government figures cited by Birr Metrics show Ethiopia earned $5.65 billion from about 44 tonnes of gold exports in 2025/26.
The oil jump comes during the Middle East war that began with US and Israeli strikes on Iran in late February, France 24 reported, and as fighting in Yemen near the Bab el-Mandeb Strait threatens shipping close to the port of Djibouti, through which Ethiopia moves most of its trade, including fuel. The Ministry of Finance congratulated Fitsum on X on Thursday morning and wished her “great success in your new responsibility.”
Sources: